[dnewhous]

When the music we listen to on CD is mixed, is it mixed by people listening to it on stereo speakers or on headphones?

 

[arnett]

mixers almost always use speakers as their reference point.

but the people who edit albums use headphones because it's easier to hear bad and good edits.

now if we could only get the mastering engineers to use headphones!

 

[dnewhous]

What exactly are the different tasks for each of these three animals?

 

[arnett]

Quote:

Originally posted by dnewhous What exactly are the different tasks for each of these three animals?

dnewhous,
welcome to head-fi, BTW.

a mixer pans each track (i.e., insrtument) in the soundstage.

example: drums, bass, and vocals in the middle and guitars and keyboards to the right and left, respectively.


and editor assembles 'takes' onto a master track.

example: a singer might record 5 vocal takes into the multi-track tape. the editor will go in and select the best moments from each track and make a master track that will be used in the mix.


a mastering engineer puts the master mixdown into a tape/disc which all other copies are taken from. a mastering engineer usually EQ's and compresses the mix. why? all the individual tracks will sound different. some will have more bass, or others will be louder than the rest, etc.
a mastering engineer 'homogenizes' the sound of the record.

i'm describing pop and rock recordings here.
classical and jazz recordings are much more straightforward.

 

[Dusty Chalk]

A good engineer will do both.

Someone like Jean-Michel Jarre has got to be major headphone crazy, but most of them spend most of the time using speakers.